The invention relates to a production and/or packaging installation according to the preamble of claim 1 and to a method of operating the same. Such production and/or packaging installations are known in the prior art.
The object of the invention is to specify a production and/or packaging installation containing a performance-limiting means, and also to specify a method of operating the same, with the result that this installation can be sold to a purchaser with a certain performance capability guaranteed and only the guaranteed performance level can be retrieved.
General performance-limiting means are known in various embodiments in the prior art. For example a performance-limiting means is known for motor vehicles to the effect that, when a predetermined maximum speed is reached, the fuel supply is blocked off, with the result that the maximum speed cannot be exceeded. Furthermore, in the case of so-called shareware, that is to say initially freely available software, it is provided that this has a limited scope of performance. It is only once a purchase price has been paid that the software user obtains a code number in order, while the software remains unchanged, to activate the entire scope of performance.
A performance-limiting means for a production and packaging installation has not been known up until now. In addition, the known performance-limiting means are not comparable with those for a production and packaging installation. In the case of the shareware, it is only ever the presence of the code number which is checked. There is no interrogation of the performance level retrieved by way of the software. In the case of motor vehicles, a form of retrievable performance level, namely the speed traveled at, is checked. The maximum value of the retrievable performance level, however, rather than being a performance level which is guaranteed to the vehicle purchaser, is a safety-related upper speed limit.